


Sleep Tight

by MrEvilside



Series: Alternative Ways of Mourning [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Compliant, But not in a happy way, Character Death Fix, Dark, Fix-It, M/M, Memory Alteration, Sort Of, Spoilers, You Have Been Warned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-09
Updated: 2018-05-09
Packaged: 2019-05-04 13:23:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14593926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrEvilside/pseuds/MrEvilside
Summary: Once on Sakaar, one belongs to the Grandmaster forever. Not even some pesky life-altering event – say, death – can change that.





	Sleep Tight

**Author's Note:**

> **Request from Anonymous:** If you're still doing frostmaster requests, could you write a small fix it with Loki's death? I mean the grandmaster is eternal, he can completely restore the injured or ill no matter how heavily damaged or sick they are, even bringing back the dead. Surely he could pop in and fix that?
> 
>  **Warning:** I wrote this fic crying, so I hope it makes you cry, too…? At least I would know my writing conveys what I intend it to. Sometimes.

_Once upon a time, a clever mortal told Loki, “Let’s do a headcount here.” It amuses Loki to remember him at such a strange time. He starts counting._

_One._

_‘Kill away.’_

_Lie._

_Two._

_‘I, Loki, prince of Asgard, Odinson, the rightful king of Jotunheim, god of mischief…’_

_Truth._

_Three._

_‘… do hereby pledge to you my undying fidelity.’_

_Lie._

_Four._

_‘You will never be a god.’_

_Truth._

_He wants to laugh. In the past ten minutes he has accumulated two truths and two lies. He isn’t doing too bad, is he? He tries to laugh. His throat hurts._

_‘I assure you, brother, the sun will shine on us again.’_

_He wants to frown. He cannot say whether this is the truth or another lie. He has no right to make such promises – not when he fears he will not be able to keep them – nor does he have the power to peer into the future and find out if he will. He tries to frown. His eyes hurt._

_Loki feels light, so light he could float away if it wasn’t for the heavy burden weighing down on him, lying on his chest as if to crush it. “Crush” – what a brutal word. He winces. It reminds him of something, but he cannot tell what it might be._

_He wants to move. It would be so easy to simply shift the person hanging onto him and fly away. He pauses, lost in thought. Where would he fly? Why does he want to flee? He tries to move. His body hurts._

_Suddenly, it dawns on him._

_His body hurts because it’s dead. His throat hurts because it’s been crushed. His eyes hurt because he cried blood._

_The person clinging to him with such despair and grief is Thor._

_‘I assure you, brother, the sun will shine on us again.’_

I’m sorry _, Loki thinks. It’s funny – he is dead for the second time and for the second time his last words are an apology._ I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have promised. I’m sorry.

         _All of a sudden, he feels it happening all over again. The bite of the Infinity Stone, catching his knife. Thanos’s hand around his throat. His feet, kicking aimlessly at the air. The pressure. The pain. The breath leaving his lungs._

_And then he is––_

 

‘No!’

         Loki bolted upright, chest heaving, tears trickling down his face. His hair was damp with sweat and stuck to his forehead and to the nape of his neck. His neck. He pressed his palm against it and scraped at the skin like he wanted to tear it off. Feeling it, inspecting it. Real skin, healthy skin.

         He looked down. He was in a king-sized bed with blue and golden covers, dressed in a garish turquoise hip cloth. His nails were painted the same colour, glinting against the pale shade of his body. White, not blue, without any sign of Jotun marks.

         He leapt out of bed and hurried – almost ran – to a full-size mirror. Despite the darkness, the light of two moons streamed into the bedroom through a window that took up an entire wall. Loki stared at his face, his eyes. His eyes were green, not red and bloodshot. His neck was fine, not broken. His skin was untarnished, not smeared with someone else’s blood and ashes.

         Under his uncomprehending gaze, his reflection disappeared and another figure replaced it on the other side of the mirror. Regardless of the hour, the Grandmaster was wearing his usual golden, red, and blue robes, and his makeup was impeccable. He gave Loki an appraising once-over, hands folded in front of him.

         ‘What are you doing still up?’ he asked as Loki blinked at him, still trying to register his non-presence.

         ‘I…’ For once in his life, Loki found himself at a loss for words. He shrugged. ‘I had a nightmare, I suppose.’

         ‘Hmm. Looks like a rough nightmare.’

         The Grandmaster watched him with the unsettling intensity he reserved to his prisoners when he had to choose whether to sentence them to death. Loki forced himself not to shift his weight from foot to foot and to keep his poise.

         ‘Quite,’ he admitted, ‘but it’s all fine now. It wasn’t real.’

         ‘Of course it wasn’t,’ the Elder agreed, a little too fast, a little too sharply.

         Loki knitted his brows, tried to figure out the truth in those bottomless pits the creature had for eyes. Yet they contained too many truths and Loki wasn’t god of those, so he couldn’t pick out the one he was searching for.

         _Let’s do a headcount here._

         Loki shuddered for no reason he could fathom. The Grandmaster drew his eyebrows together and pursed his lips. ‘What was that?’ he questioned.

         ‘A… memory,’ Loki answered.

         The Elder didn’t encourage a conversation on that topic.

         Loki cleared his throat. ‘Is there something you wish to tell me, Grandmaster? If I disturbed your sleep, I offer you my deepest apol––’

         ‘How long have you been on Sakaar, Loki?’

         Loki stuttered. It was unusual for the Grandmaster to interrupt someone who was paying him their respects; even more unusual for him to interrupt _Loki_. He was, after all, one of the new favourites. Nonetheless, he obliged: ‘Two weeks.’

         ‘And how did you arrive?’

         Loki grimaced. ‘Through the Bifrost. My… sister sent me here by accident.’

         ‘So you could have died.’

         ‘So I…’ Loki’s voice hitched in his throat. ‘So I could have died, yes, if it hadn’t been for your… endless generosity.’

         The response brought a smug smile to the Elder’s lips. It made Loki’s skin crawl, so he reacted to the discomfort as he did best – he put his silver tongue to good use. ‘Why so many questions, my lord?’

         ‘I can’t remember _everything_ ,’ the Grandmaster said, all his mysterious gravity altogether forgotten. His laughter didn’t make sparks glint in his eyes as it did when it was genuine, though, and then he asked, ‘Can you?’, as though it was very important that Loki gave the right answer.

         What that answer was, Loki did not know, so he took a risk and offered his best one: ‘No, Grandmaster. Of course not.’

         ‘Go back to sleep, Loki,’ the Elder instructed. ‘Tomorrow it’s a busy day.’

         ‘Oh, is it?’

         _Funny_ , Loki mused to himself. _I don’t remember what day it is tomorrow_.

         ‘Of course!’ The Grandmaster clapped. ‘Every day is busy here, isn’t it? It’s all fun, fun, _fun_. I look after my people, don’t I?’

         Again, Loki had a feeling he must say the right thing.

         ‘Indeed you do, Grandmaster. I am only too lucky you found me.’

         The Elder’s giggle and his last statement would play over and over in Loki’s head as he returned to bed and lay awake in the dark, wondering, reaching out for a thought, yet failing to grasp it: ‘You can’t, you can’t imagine just _how_ lucky, Loki dearest.’

         Eventually, Loki closed his eyes and slept.

 

_‘No!’_

_Loki wants to ask, ‘No – what?’ The word echoes everywhere, spoken by a familiar voice. Loki doesn’t know who it is. He tries to ask. His throat hurts._

_‘You really are the worst brother.’_

_He wants to roll his eyes. And the Most Perceptive Award of the century goes to––he doesn’t know. He tries to roll his eyes. They hurt._

_Nothing comes after that. Loki despairs. If only the person could say one more thing, only one more sentence, he is sure he would recognise the voice. He is so close. So close he could wrap his fingers around the answer, as if he was throttling someone. Throttling? What a funny analogy. Why would he come up with that?_

_Suddenly, it dawns on him._

_His throat hurts because it’s been crushed. His eyes hurt because he cried blood._

_The person calling him “brother” – the worst brother – is Thor._

_Thor – where is he?_

_Wherever he went, Loki cannot follow him, cannot even talk to him one last time. Thor’s voice – whatever is left of his voice – is gone, too. Loki is alone._

_All of a sudden, he feels it happening all over again. The bite of the Infinity Stone, catching his knife. Thanos’s hand around his throat. His feet, kicking aimlessly at the air. The pressure. The pain. The breath leaving his lungs._

_And then he is––_

 

‘No!’

         Loki woke up again and again realised he was alive, even though his brain was shouting the opposite. Yet no spell is powerful enough to undo death, so his must have been a dream, right? He must have been alive all along. Right?

         The Grandmaster came to him in the mirror again, drawn by his screams.

         This time, it was Loki who had questions – or rather, _one_ question.

         ‘Where is Thor?’

         The Grandmaster raised a hand and touched the surface of the mirror on his end. ‘Do you, do you trust me?’ he asked.

         _No_ , Loki thought.

         ‘Yes,’ he assured.

         A fraction of a second too late to make it look spontaneous, he lifted his own arm and pressed his fingertips against the Grandmaster’s. The Elder smiled at him. ‘If you do, then you, you know I only want the best for you, yes? I only want the best for all of the things I find.’

         ‘Where is my brother?’ Loki repeated.

         Something happened. He wasn’t sure what, but he sensed it spreading from the Grandmaster to him through their joined fingers. Loki pulled away. Too late.

         He blinked and brought a hand to his head.

         ‘What is it?’ the Grandmaster said.

         ‘I have a splitting headache,’ Loki murmured. He attempted a spell to heal himself, but it didn’t work. ‘I think… I should go back to bed.’

         ‘I think you should,’ the Elder agreed, tilting his head to the side, and flashed him a beaming smile. ‘Sleep tight. Remember you’re safe. I will always be here if you have any more nightmares.’

         Loki nodded. He could barely hear the Elder over the painful noise in his head. It sounded like something was banging on a door, desperate to get out.

         ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Thank you, Grandmaster.’

**Author's Note:**

> • Most quotes are from Avengers: Infinity War. One quote is from Avengers: Assemble.  
> • I’m taking requests for more FrostMaster fics [here](http://mrevilside.tumblr.com/post/173599118197/accepting-frostmaster-requests). Ask away :)  
> • I could write a second chapter for this, from the Grandmaster’s POV. Let me know what you think!


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